Lacuna
by Aurora West
Summary: As much as Thor's beating at the hands of the Hulk had delighted Loki, he hadn't ever truly entertained the idea that Thor would lose. Loki bargains for Thor's life on Sakaar.


Author's note: This includes some non-graphic mentions of dub-con.

* * *

Loki couldn't decide whether or not to watch as the Hulk reached the zenith of his leap and arced back towards the ground inside the arena. The Grandmaster's suite was high enough that most of the gore from the fights wasn't particularly visible except as a bright red splotch against the sand, the same color as half the buildings in the city. Not that gore had ever particularly bothered Loki. He got no pleasure from it, but he was—or had been—an Asgardian prince, and he'd been in enough battles to become more inured than perhaps was healthy to the sight of blood, brains, and assorted innards.

Then again, it wasn't the idea of seeing blood that bothered him. As much as Thor's beating at the hands of that beast had delighted him at the beginning of this fight, he hadn't ever _truly _entertained the idea that Thor would lose. After all, he was Asgardian. He was a god, and even without his hammer, there weren't many creatures in the galaxy that could hold their own against him.

But Thor had that obedience disc on his neck, and the Grandmaster didn't want to see his champion lose.

Loki snapped his mouth shut, realizing too late that he'd worn a look of slack-jawed dismay for a few seconds too long. Shit. He was angry at Thor—angry at Thor for dumping the blame on him for everything that had happened, for giving him the silent treatment, for refusing to be grateful that he had come to visit him in that disgusting prison he was being kept in. But most of all, he was angry that Thor had rebuffed his offer of help, which Loki had meant sincerely, and which had come from a place of…of…or, for heaven's sake. Of _affection_.

The past three weeks had been an exercise in sublimating yet another dose of pain, grief, and loss. So, well, the usual, really. He'd told himself Thor was dead and that he didn't care even while deep down, he'd held onto the stupid, desperate hope that his brother was alive and had escaped their sister (their _sister_. Even now, he couldn't decide if he was primarily shocked, horrified, or delighted that the tables had finally turned, and Thor finally knew how it felt to find out you'd been lied to about everything for your whole life). There hadn't been much possibility of ever learning the truth, so he'd just shut it away and concentrated on getting to the top of this garbage planet.

But then Thor had appeared and suddenly Loki had his brother back—but only for as long as Thor was trapped here. Because Thor wanted to go _back_. Back to Asgard and certain death. He was an idiot.

An idiot, yes. But he was still Loki's brother. And lying helpless on the ground, with that obedience disc pumping neurotoxins into his veins, he was about to unquestioningly be killed. No showing up in a few weeks strapped in a chair, having somehow beaten the odds. Just dead.

Loki clasped and unclasped his hands and jiggled his leg. Oh, he was about to do something he was going to regret. It was just, he would regret the alternative much more.

"Grandmaster," Loki said, swiveling on the sofa. The Grandmaster was leaning forward, intently watching the Hulk pummel Thor, but at this, he turned to look at Loki. Smiling with every ounce of charm he possessed, Loki said, "I wonder if, perhaps, you might stop the fight. Call it a draw."

The Grandmaster straightened up and cocked his head. "A draw," he repeated.

"Yes," Loki said, wondering if it could really be that easy.

Of course not. The Grandmaster looked back to the fight going on in the arena. "The thing with a _draw _is that it makes it look like my champion didn't _win_. And my champion always wins—he wouldn't be a champion without winning, would he?"

Loki licked his lips. "Yes, of course," he said. It had struck him that the Grandmaster had a bit of an unhealthy fixation on his champion, as though he identified perhaps just slightly too much with his dominance and brutality. No, the Grandmaster's champion didn't lose, just as the Grandmaster himself didn't lose. "I just thought…well, never mind. You're right." He flicked his fingers dismissively. "Your champion can't lose. Forget I said anything."

"Well, wait, wait just a minute." The Grandmaster scooted closer and Loki tried not to smirk. "What did you think?"

The longer this conversation went on, the greater the likelihood that Thor ended up dead despite Loki's efforts, and that outcome was both generally undesirable and embarrassing. If he was going to _try_, then it had better work. Sentimentality had never been a good look on him. Loki wrinkled his nose and shook his head, looking back down at the arena. Thor was obscured by the Hulk. "It was a foolish idea. Unimportant."

"I'm the judge of what's a foolish idea around here and what isn't," the Grandmaster said.

_That _was for sure. Loki glanced at him, waited a theatrically long beat, then turned to face the Grandmaster. "Why not keep _both _of them as champions?" he said. With a gesture towards the crowd, he said, "You heard them cheering for Th—for the Lord of Thunder. They were chanting his name, Grandmaster. They don't _want _to see him lose. These games are to entertain people, right?"

"These games are to entertain _me_."

Loki ducked his head and gave the Grandmaster a disarming smile. "Obviously. I don't mean to suggest otherwise. After all, you built Sakaar from nothing, so it's only right that all of this—" He gestured lazily. "—is for you. Think about it, though." Leaning back and slinging an arm over the back of the couch, he crossed one leg over the other, held a hand out, and said, "That chanting? If you give these people what they want, they'll be grateful."

This may have been a misstep. Did the Grandmaster care if his subjects were grateful? It was something Loki had enjoyed while he'd ruled Asgard. Knowing that he was making people happy, that they loved him, that was the part he'd liked about being king. But the Grandmaster, he'd feed his people to a fire dragon for the entertainment value. He'd feed a fire dragon to _itself _for the entertainment value. Or his people to themselves, for that matter. And honestly, his people would probably cheer that on, too. There was nihilism, and then there was Sakaar.

"And," Loki added hastily, "if you have _two _champions, you could do some sort of…" He had to search for the right word. What was it? He'd seen it on Earth after he'd brought Odin to the nursing home in New York City, on the television in that bar he'd had a drink at. The beer had been watery and the sport had seemed silly. It came to him and he raised a finger. "_Brackets_. Have them face off against lesser foes, working their way up until they face each other. Build the drama, really hype the whole thing up." He felt like he'd been talking for hours and he hated how nervous it was making him.

The Grandmaster drummed his fingers on his knee, chewing on his lip. Loki tried not to hold his breath. This hinged on him _not _being obvious. At least, he felt like it did. To be honest, the Grandmaster was too much of a wild card for Loki to ever really know what worked on him and what didn't. That was why he kept smiling. The smile worked. The smile always worked.

Finally, the Grandmaster made a noise, then snapped and motioned to one of the guards on the side of the room. "Stop the fight," he said.

Loki felt a curious leaping sensation in his throat. Relief, it pained him to admit. As a small army of guards armed with stun guns stormed the arena to break up the fight—not that it was much of a fight, as Thor hadn't moved in at least two minutes—he sat back and exhaled, closing his eyes for a second. Thor wouldn't thank him for this. That was fine. Loki didn't want his thanks, anyway. He just didn't want him dead.

There was a sharp, loud crack and Loki jumped despite himself. One of the guards attempting to subdue the Hulk had gone airborne and hit the window, and the blood and brains oozing out of his skull kept him glued to the glass for a few seconds before he slid down with a squeak, leaving a smear of red and pink glistening there. Well, at least the beast was flinging around the guards instead of his brother. They weren't having much luck with the subduing, but several of them were dragging Thor out of the arena by his ankles.

"So," the Grandmaster said. Loki looked at him, one eyebrow raised. "I did you a favor. Now you can do one for me."

Loki's brow furrowed a little and he tilted his head. "I beg your pardon?"

There was a look on the Grandmaster's face that Loki had no way of describing except that it was very particular to the Grandmaster. It was a sort of calculating, grasping, hungry look, the sort of look that was either very easy to manipulate—or impossible. "What part of 'you can do me a favor' don't you understand?"

With an easy smile and a chuckle, Loki said, "I'm not sure what favor you've granted _me_, Grandmaster."

The Grandmaster smiled and wobbled his head from side to side. "Your brother down there. Hey, look, I get it. Blood's thicker than water."

"Ah." Loki gave the sort of polite laugh that one did at social events that were only attended out of obligation.

"Of course," the Grandmaster said musingly, "you said you were adopted, didn't you? That explains the resemblance. The lack thereof, I mean. I think you lucked out, not sharing that gene pool." The Grandmaster's eyes raked down Loki's body and he had to try not to roll his eyes. _This _again. Not that he didn't appreciation the, er, appreciation, especially in comparison to Golden Boy Thor, the perfect Asgardian male. Most people decidedly did _not _prefer Loki's looks. Though, thinking about it, he knew some of the Grandmaster's predilections. Maybe it wasn't much of a compliment.

As the Grandmaster met Loki's eyes again, he scooted closer on the couch and leaned forward. Some people would have moved away. Not Loki. He remained exactly where he was, a slight smile on his face. He'd seen and survived so much worse than Sakaar and the Grandmaster. Some of it still gave him nightmares, the kind of nightmares that you woke sweating and terrified from. Usually he'd taste blood where he'd been biting his lip to keep from making a sound. A few of the places he'd been, making a sound would have resulted in a very prolonged, very painful death.

He'd never told anyone about any of it. Never poured his heart out to his mind-controlled minions on Midgard, never told his mother all the times she'd visited him in his cell that year in the dungeons on Asgard. She'd known how much more broken he was, but she hadn't known how to talk to him about it. Not that Loki blamed her. Even if she'd tried, he wouldn't have _known_ how to talk about it. He'd have lashed out and said something he regretted. That both of them regretted, actually, much like the last thing he'd ever said to Frigga. And the idea of trying to explain to Thor or Odin was laughable. Mother would have listened to him. He'd stopped expecting that courtesy from his brother and adopted father long ago.

Which was all to say, the Grandmaster was nothing. The Grandmaster staring at him like he was building a meticulous mental image of him without his armor and leathers on, also nothing. The 'favor' that the Grandmaster was going to demand wasn't much of a mystery, but Loki would play dumb.

A tiny smile still on his face, Loki said, "I'm flattered. The, ah, Lord of Thunder always had more admirers." Loki risked flicking his eyes towards the arena. Thor had been removed, and the Hulk was surrounded by the guards that had managed to stay out of his reach. At least the Grandmaster's champion had a body count for tonight, even if the victims weren't the intended ones. The crowd didn't care. Loki had been right about that—some of them were still chanting "Lord of Thun-der! Lord of Thun-der!" It was almost enough to make him proud of his brother.

"Mm." Somehow, the Grandmaster was closer, and after a moment he reached out and put a hand on Loki's knee, which gradually became a hand above Loki's knee, and then a hand sliding upwards along his inner thigh. "It seems to me your brother's probably going to need some medical attention." When Loki didn't say anything, the Grandmaster went on, "And it also seems to me that the healers might all be unavoidably detained unless _you _come to my penthouse in…oh, however long it takes you to freshen up. Let's say an hour?"

Loki held the Grandmaster's eyes for a moment, feeling one of his eyebrows quirking up in amusement. Or possibly fatalism. Hard to tell the difference sometimes. Oh, the things he was about to do in exchange for his brother's life. It wasn't that the Grandmaster was bad in bed. He was millions of years old, it would be a bit embarrassing for him if he was. It was…well, he wasn't exactly Loki's type. The hedonism was a surprising turn-off. "And my brother will be looked after?" he asked.

The Grandmaster held two fingers up. "I have to take care of my other champion, don't I?"

Allowing himself a wider, one might say more obsequious, smile, Loki inclined his head and said, "Thank you, Grandmaster."

With a low chuckle, the Grandmaster reached out and ran a hand down Loki's jawline, along his throat, and down his chest. If he wanted a reaction, Loki didn't give him one, but that only seemed to amuse him. As he got to his feet, the Grandmaster said, "I'll be expecting you."

Loki leaned back on the couch as the Grandmaster sauntered away. Absently, he reached for the drink that he'd abandoned at the beginning of the fight and bolted it down, staring out into the arena. The crowd was dissipating, and it was impossible to tell from this distance whether they were satisfied with the outcome of the evening or not. He wondered if any of them had bet on this result—if so, they'd have just gotten quite the payout. Loki himself, fortunately, wasn't out any money, despite what he'd told Thor about placing a wager against him. He knew better than to bet against his brother in a fight. But he also knew that saying what he had would get a reaction. He'd been right about that, too.

The suite was emptying out as well, when Loki glanced over his shoulder. There were a few women standing around a table in the back, all glaring at him. He thought they might be the Grandmaster's previous favorites, whom he'd replaced when he'd sauntered into Sakaar three weeks ago, having just been spit out of a wormhole with his own dagger jammed in his arm.

Loki turned back around and leaned forward, his elbows on his knees as he fidgeted with his fingers. The decision he'd just made had been rooted in base, childish, weak sentiment, made all the more pathetic by the fact that he'd tried to kill Thor himself, seriously tried to kill him, more than once. It was funny, though. The hate that had driven him, that deep, corrosive bitterness, was gone. Slipped through his fingers over the years, though there'd been times he'd tried to hold onto it. And somewhere, he'd turned a corner and gone from complicit-in-if-not-entirely-responsible-for-his-brother's-attempted-murder to—

Well. More or less prostituting himself out to save his brother's life. There really wasn't any other way to look at it. Oh well.

Loki took a breath and straightened up. He had an hour, so he supposed he'd do what the Grandmaster had suggested and 'freshen up.' On the way out of the suite, he grabbed another drink. Maybe it wouldn't be a bad idea to get a bottle from the bar. This was not, he suspected, going to be a short night.

* * *

A servant told him where Thor was being kept. He'd been tightlipped at first, but Loki had rolled his eyes, snapped his fingers, and asked again with the aid of some minor magical persuasion. That had been a far more effective tactic. Eighty-ninth floor, straight down the corridor, stop at the forcefield or the forcefield will stop you.

The mention of the forcefield had given him pause. The reason for it seemed obvious. Thor had been taken to the Hulk's…apartment? Penthouse? Cage? What need that beast would have for an apartment, Loki didn't know. But it didn't take much for the memory of being flung around like a rag doll by him to come bubbling to the surface.

As the elevator climbed towards the eighty-ninth floor, Loki couldn't help flinching. That forcefield had better hold.

The elevator dinged and stopped, the doors sliding open on a hallway screaming with bright red and white. What an eyesore. Probably the Hulk's idea of interior decorating, it really had the feel of a five-year-old scribbling on the wall with a crayon.

He pushed away from the back of the elevator and sucked in a hiss of air. It didn't have anything on the agony he'd been in after being Hulk-smashed, but he was in pain, and it wasn't pleasant. The Grandmaster had made _requests_. That was the nice way of putting it, at least. The one time Loki had hesitated, the Grandmaster had grabbed his face with one hand, his fingers jammed into Loki's cheeks, and said, "I hear the Lord of Thunder's in pretty bad shape." So Loki had smiled, resisted the urge to massage his jaw, and done what the Grandmaster had wanted. The only reason he was up here was to make sure his investment hadn't been for nothing.

There were no doors in the hallway, so even if he'd been prone to forgetting directions, it wouldn't have been an issue. The forcefield was invisible, but out of the corner of his eye he saw its control panel on the wall and stopped walking, nose inches from the barrier.

He shifted on his feet, trying to find a way to stand that would cause the minimum amount of discomfort. At least the bruise on his neck could be—and had been—glamored away. While he was in the presence of other people, at least.

Inside the room, he could see a group of women huddled around something on the floor. He furrowed his brow and narrowed his eyes, trying to get a glimpse of what it was, but the women blocked it from view. Was it Thor? And was it a bad sign that healers—presumably—were still hovering around him? Then again, if he was dead, there'd be no need for them.

Though he supposed they could have been morticians.

At that moment, one of the women glanced towards him. Their eyes met and she looked startled before she ducked her head down again, appearing to murmur something to her fellow healers. Then, she rose to her feet and came towards him, stopping short of the forcefield on the other side.

"No one is allowed on this floor," she said.

With one small exhalation of laughter, Loki said, "I must have gotten lost."

She obviously didn't believe him, but he hadn't really been trying. At least there was no family resemblance between him and Thor. It really precluded the chance of thoughtful glances from one to the other. People who didn't know them didn't tend to guess the familial relationship. Most people weren't watchful enough to pick up the fact that the two of them shared dozens of mannerisms, despite Loki's best intentions. "You should go," she said.

He didn't respond. After a minute, he nodded towards the group of huddled women and asked, "What's going on over there?" When she clamped her lips shut, he said, "I was told the Lord of Thunder was being kept here."

"Who would tell you that?" she asked. Loki just shrugged. The woman glanced over her shoulder, then back to him, and sighed. "Yes. He is."

Loki tilted his head. "How is he?"

"Alive," the woman said shortly. "And lucky to be so."

Which was no more or less than he'd expected. He could leave it at that, go home right now to the apartment he'd secured for himself on charm alone, with no money and no way of getting any in the foreseeable future. Get some sleep and wake up in the morning and try to figure out…something. He wasn't sure what he was trying to figure out yet, but there was always something.

Instead, he asked, "Can you help him?"

The woman blinked in surprise. Possibly—probably, actually—no one had ever shown any interest in the wellbeing of any of the Grandmaster's gladiators. The Hulk had this entire suite to himself, bought with the favor of crowds screaming his name every few weeks, and yet no one cared to try to visit. Why would they? He was a monster. A trained monster, maybe, but a monster, nonetheless. Loki knew the feeling. And that was the life Thor had consigned himself to by refusing Loki's offer of help. Really, he deserved everything he'd gotten.

"Never mind," Loki said, starting to turn away.

"Yes," the woman said quickly. "Yes, we can help him." She hesitated, and he met her eyes. "He's like no man I've ever seen. His muscles seem to be made of iridium beneath his skin."

Loki rolled his eyes. "Yes, yes, I know, there's no one more magnificent than Thor."

"Thor?" the woman said with interest. "Is that his name?"

Narrowing his eyes and smiling mirthlessly, Loki said, "I think the Grandmaster would prefer you call him Lord of Thunder."

With a pleasant smile, the healer said, "And we must obey the Grandmaster."

"Indeed." Oh, he knew. How he knew.

The forcefield shimmered as it refreshed itself, and after a moment the woman said, "I've seen you here only recently. But the Grandmaster seems very taken by you."

"A talent I have," he replied with a tiny smile. "It's useful when you end up in a place like this."

There was a flash of something in her eyes. An almost, if he had to put words to it, mischievous transgression, and she said, "And do _you _have a name, or only what the Grandmaster wants you to be called?"

"Hm." His smile widened a little, but he didn't answer. The healers gathered around Thor were having a discussion, staring down at him in intense concentration. At the periphery of his vision, he could see his…informant? Temporary co-conspirator? watching him. Finally, he flicked his eyes back to her and said, "It's Loki."

The healer glanced over her shoulder at her companions, then back to him. "And neither you nor the Lord of Thunder are from here."

With a chuckle, Loki said, "No, most definitely not." Even if he hadn't already told her this, it couldn't have been more obvious. There was a certain look in the eyes of every Sakaaran he'd met, a sort of existential resignation. They all had an air about them that nothing mattered, and try as he might, Loki couldn't inhabit the same sensibility. Life would be much easier if he could just convince himself that nothing was particularly important, but so far he hadn't figured out how to do it.

But then she surprised him, saying, "You're from the same place, then."

At this, he hesitated. "What makes you say that?"

She shrugged. "You have the same demeanor."

"Considering the Lord of Thunder has been unconscious for the past several hours, I'm not sure how I should take that."

That made her laugh. "I watched the fight. You seem cut from the same cloth, somehow." That made him snort. Thor probably wouldn't like to hear that, cut from the same cloth as—what had he said? His weaselly, greasy brother? This didn't go unnoticed by the woman, who eyed him as she went on, "He's proud. So are you. The gladiators usually are. The Grandmaster's favorites…"

Though she trailed off, he could fill in the blanks. Anyone with any pride wouldn't cozy up to the Grandmaster. Well, he'd let go of his pride right around the time his Goddess of Death sister had been three steps in front of him and about to gut him on a sword that she'd conjured out of thin air.

"Are you?" she asked. "From the same place?"

He laughed and looked down at the ground, then back up to her. "That's a complicated question."

This response didn't seem to surprise her, but she dropped the line of questioning. Perhaps he shouldn't be having this conversation at all. Perhaps this was going to count against him in the Grandmaster's indecipherable ranking system. But Loki prided himself on being a keen watcher and reader of people, and he didn't sense any danger from her.

"So, Loki, the Grandmaster's New Favorite—" Oh, now _there _was a snappy title. Really had a ring to it, Prince of Asgard had nothing on it. "—was it you who stopped the fight?"

Startled, he looked at her, his eyebrows coming together in a furrow before he shook his head and replied with an easy smile, "The Grandmaster stopped the fight."

"The Grandmaster doesn't stop fights," she said pleasantly, as if this didn't unfailingly result in the gruesome death of someone on the arena floor. "You know the Lord of Thunder, and you're the Grandmaster's favorite. You must have stopped the fight."

He stared at her for a moment. Then, ignoring her question, he remarked, "I never said I knew him."

"Why would you be here if you didn't?" she asked, sounding deeply amused.

"Morbid curiosity?" Loki replied, raising his eyebrows.

Her tone had reminded him of his mother, when he'd said something he didn't mean and she'd seen through it instantly. It had always been tempting to attribute that ability to her powers, her gift of seeing things with more than her eyes. But the older he'd gotten, the more he'd realized that she simply knew him better than anyone. That all his faults and insecurities and masks had always been laid bare to her. And she'd loved him anyway. Of all the many, many things he'd always felt he didn't deserve, her love was perhaps the capstone atop the whole edifice.

He drew in a swift breath and put his mother out of his mind. She was gone. Their father was gone. They couldn't go home to Asgard. He was on his own, unless he could keep his idiot brother alive and confined here on Sakaar.

The healer was still staring at him, and finally, Loki sighed and turned his gaze back towards Thor. "He's my brother," he admitted.

"I thought so."

"Did you."

The woman cocked her head at him. "It's obvious how much you care."

At that, a bark of laughter escaped him. "Me? Care? I'm afraid you've sorely misjudged the situation."

There was that look that reminded him of Mother again. She didn't call out this very obvious lie, though. Instead, she smiled and said, "We'll take care of him. He's strong. He'll be fine."

For a long moment, Loki hesitated. Then, he inclined his head and said, "Thank you."

"And I'll tell him you were here," she said.

Loki's head jerked up and his hand shot out, palm out. He only remembered the forcefield just in time. "I'd really rather you didn't," he said, his nose wrinkling almost apologetically, as though he didn't actually mean _don't you dare tell my brother I was here or I'll make you regret the day you were born_. He'd cast a spell on her to make her forget his visit, if he had to. He'd cast a spell on all of them. When she just stared at him, he said, "You work for the Grandmaster. I trust that means you're practiced in the art of discretion."

There was a second that he almost thought she was going to argue with him. Give him some sort of speech about letting his brother know how much he cared for him, how important it was to Loki that he survive, that no permanent damage had been done, that he was alright. That Thor's absence, were it to come to pass, would be a lacuna in the fabric of Loki's life that would not, and could not, be mended. The value of _family, _or some such sentimental tripe. Or maybe he was projecting, and these were just the things that _he _knew he should admit to himself.

Well, it wasn't going to happen. Thor _really_ wasn't that important to him. Loki had had a good thing going here on Sakaar, and then Thor had shown up. Ruining everything, as usual. What was Loki _supposed _to do? Even if he didn't really care, he couldn't sit back and let Thor die. That was the only reason he'd done what he'd done. A sort of distant caring, a vestigial family bond born of a thousand years of brotherhood which had nearly snapped but was still just barely hanging together.

Right.

"If that's what you wish," the healer said. When he nodded, watching her for any sign of treachery, she said, "I must return to the Lord of Thunder's care."

"Of course," Loki said. "Thank you for your time."

As he turned away, his eyes landed again on the access panel that controlled the forcefield to the apartment. The healer was walking away, so he stepped closer to it to study it, noting where fingerprints were smudged on the keypad. Then, he smiled slightly and made his way back to the elevator. Once he was on it and heading down to the ground floor, he held up a hand and a series of numbers and symbols appeared in the air in front of him, limned with green.

When the Grandmaster had satisfied himself earlier, Loki had been dismissed with a lazy, "I'm not really in the mood to cuddle, so, you know. Feel free to head out." It had taken all Loki's willpower not to laugh and inform the man that he'd never 'cuddled' in his life. He'd scooped up his clothes and decamped to the bathroom, and by the time he'd cleaned himself up and gotten dressed, the Grandmaster was snoring.

For just a second, Loki had stood there staring at him, contemplating the probability of survival if that unfortunate accident were to befall the Grandmaster right now. Slim, probably. There were guards outside and Topaz was never far with the melt-stick. The Grandmaster would expect one of his playthings to make an attempt on his life. A better opportunity would present itself.

Instead, he'd taken advantage of the Grandmaster's post-sex coma to riffle through the massive, gaudy desk in the penthouse's living room. There would have to be something useful there, and sure enough, in one drawer was one of the octagonal discs that they used to store data on Sakaar. Loki had picked it up, hesitated, and then silently padded across the room to one of the computer terminals set into the gilt walls.

There was biometric security on it, of course, but Loki simply gave himself one of the Grandmaster's eyes until the computer unlocked for him. Strings of symbols and numbers flashed up on the screen when he slotted the disc into place. Codes of some kind, probably. Access codes to the complex's security system? It wouldn't be difficult to find out. He waved a hand over the screen and then flicked his fingers. An exact replica appeared in the air next to it.

There was a sound from the other room and Loki had hastily vanished the illusory copy and pulled the disc from the wall, then slipped it back into the desk where he'd found it.

He allowed himself a small smile at the memory as the elevator sped downward. If he was going to make a trade, then he was going to come out one ahead. The panel outside the Hulk's apartment had been smudged to match one of the lines on the list he'd found. Security codes, then. His brother's life was worth what he'd given, but one never knew when he'd have to make the next trade.

Catching sight of his reflection in the elevator door, Loki allowed his glamor to drop away. Well, some of it. The Asgardian glamor, the glamor that made him who he was, he'd be damned if he ever let that fall. He'd never tried. Didn't actually know if he could. Even in death, he'd hold onto it if he could. His parents had bestowed it on him, and while that wasn't a reason to keep it, it also wasn't a reason to reject it. It was stronger than a simple spell, went far deeper. When he'd first discovered he was Jötunn, he'd seen it as a trick, a simple mask. But it was beyond that. Did it even count as glamor anymore?

Well, never mind. In truth, none of that mattered, because he was on Sakaar now. Stuck there. What did it matter if he was Asgardian? No one here cared, and if he was smart, he would endeavor not to, as well.

He pulled his collar aside and studied the bruise on his neck in the reflection. It would heal. Thor, too, would heal. Of course, a healed Thor would be a Thor who was trying to escape this place, and Loki still thought they were safer here. He put a finger to the bruise, narrowing his eyes at the pain, and snorted softly. That, it had to be said, depended on how long he remained in the Grandmaster's favor.

The elevator reached the ground floor and Loki furrowed his brow and glanced up as the doors slid open. Bruise invisible again, he strode out, cape swirling around his legs. When his luck ran out here, he would make it somewhere else. Alone, most likely, because that was how it had always been.

But—the thought snuck into his head—if his brother wanted to come along, that might be alright, too.


End file.
